Our alarm goes off at 07:00. It is around 9 degrees early this morning. We have plenty of time to clean the apartment, pack our suitcases and walk downhill to the bus stop. We get ready pretty quickly and ensure our apartment is spotless. We leave early so we have a buffer of time prior to train departure. Bus C23 arrives and in about fifteen minutes we are at Part Dieu stop and navigate ourselves and suitcases in tow to the huge train station. Lana tries our bus tickets that we purchased the previous day but forgot to validate--they still good! So we got a two for one bus ticket for a while 2.70Euro each!! T'he place is flooded with people. Our first stop is Paul restaurant for some French pastries and a tea for Lana. Funny, but when Lana got her tea she noticed no taste and discovered the girl forgot to add the tea bag!
We have a long wait before Track #B is listed for our train. We realize in France and Spain that the tracks don't get listed until maybe 20 mins before the train is due to arrive. It's not like Germany where they print the schedules and everything arrives on the minute. We grab an elevator to the floor above and wait for departing passengers to exit then first on our train car. Lady with a small dog sitting across from us and constantly in conversation with her pet. Open seating and interesting that humans as a rule will always want to sit together. Scheduled departure at 09:16 and we have our usual second class tickets so no seat assignments. We leave exactly on time. Lana facing the correct direction.
Our train will be making stops on the way to Dijon. About a two hour train ride from Lyon to Dijon. As we get closer to Dijon the sun is shining! We arrive around 11:15 and tow our suitcases down some cobbled streets to our Airbnb apartment. We access the lock box per instructions to get the key fob for entry and we are inside before 12 noon. The Wifi is working. Inside our apartment Lana has warmed up a "saucisson brioche" we purchased in Lyon. Yummy lunch. Plus, a pretzel. This will tide me over until dinner. We were hoping to get to the Marché Central, but it closes at 13:00.
Saucisson Brioche for our lunch. So delicious!
Instead, we make the shortish walk to La Cité de la Gastronomie et du Vin. It is now really warm and sunny! I get to wear my sunglasses. Free entry, but some of the permanent exhibits need payment, but their subject matter does not interest us. You obtain a ticket which you scan to gain entry to each exhibit or site. Plus, you are provided a code for the bathrooms. Very large place and outdoor spots as well. Many restaurants, although not many people here as we think it is off-season? This city is the entry to Burgundy. They are proud of their history of wine, food, cuisine and culture and rightfully so. In fact, much of our food etiquette and manners are derived from the French.
Map of La Cité de la Gastronomie et du Vin.
Translation--what are you waiting for? There's no risk, it's a Margaux 2005!
This (La Cave de La Cité) was my primary destination inside La Cité. I can do some wine tasting of Burgundy wines! My favourite Pinot Noir is Burgundy. You purchase a pre-paid card and when you see a wine you want to try then insert the card and selection the amount of pour. Voila, the wine pours into your glass for your personal tasting. The only downside was I wanted to only sample wines they had in stock for purchase. I did sample three Burgundies and purchased two of those I sampled. The more expensive the wines then the higher the tasting fee. I am pretty happy as I found two excellent Burgundies that are Premier Cru (not Grand Cru). We will be taking these bottles back to Vancouver.
Given we did not want to haul these two bottles around we returned to our apartment to offload. I wanted to walk to
Musée Rudé, but we have lots of time so no rush. We are in the middle of the historical centre of Dijon and mostly pedestrian streets. There are cute little electric buses zipping around. Many churches, cathedrals, museums, shops, restaurants, plazas etc. Very old buildings. Lana gets to do some shopping! Remember earlier when we said she was freezing and realizing she should have packed a coat for this trip? She finds a fake fur Leopard print Winter jacket that she loves at Mango and that will be her big purchase in France (a whopping 99Euros). But at least she is warm now! I guess going out wearing 2 shirts, a cashmere sweater and a sport jacket wasn't working?
Very beautiful tiled roofs.
Beautiful cathedral!
We make it to
Musée Rudé. Very famous French sculpturist. This was the artist who designed the Arc de Triomphe in Paris and quite the rebel. Many of his statues are on display. Walking by, Lana looked in from the street and this is what she saw!!
Rudé sculpture that is one of the reliefs on the Arc De Triomphe in Paris.
Many fellow tourists in the streets. It is good to have no rush or destination. We bought two croissants we will have for breakfast tomorrow. One was coconut and the other raspberry flavoured.
Beautiful old buildings.
This bakery has a cool feature where you do not exchange any money with the cashier. During Covid they bought this machine where you insert your bill and/or change so nobody needs to physically handle cash or coins. Plus this solved a lot of issues when cashing out at the end of the day and things didn't balance because of human error. Lana remembers years ago (pre-Covid) when a restaurant in New York announced it was going to be cashless--the uproar that took place was unbelievable. Now it's pretty standard and you have to ask if a business takes cash. We saw similar machines in Germany last time we were there.
For dinner tonight our plan is to walk around the corner to
Fuseau Cave du Monde Gourmande recommended by our Airbnb host Louise. It opens at 18:00! Hooray! Pretty much a tapas/mezze menu and a great wine list. We are the first diners, but later three adults and their toddler show up and sit right beside us. Gentle/permissive parenting is alive in France as well. If their toddler didn't get his way then it was a tantrum. Anyway, small plates and lots of good choices. I drink a red blend from Portugal's Douro Valley and a Syrah from Morocco. We ordered four dishes and enjoyed each of them. Server was decent, but not attentive. Total bill = 62.50Euro.
Menu
Pork terrine.
Halloumi cheese fritters.
Haddock and smoked Cod.
Sea Bream Gravlax. Feta cheese.
Espace Intérieur furniture store. Fortunately for me Lana couldn't take anything home. But she LOVED all the furniture!!
Already after 20:00 and Lana tired so we made the very short walk back to the apartment. This is a busy area so many people on the street below talking quite loudly. It will be noisy here tonight! Total steps = 11,800 with 4 total floors elevation gain.
Comments
Post a Comment